Hit And Ron I

Jersey City, New Jersey, September 3, 2003:

Jogger and politico Ron never saw what hit him. It turns out he was blindsided by a whitetail deer.

"I went out for a jog about 20 to 6 Wednesday morning, and I was jogging on Seeler Street when all of a sudden I was face-down on the pavement," he said. "A woman who saw it all said I was hit by a deer. I never saw it coming."

Ron, representing the Ronatarian Party in the 2004 presidential election, was treated at St. Mary's Hospital for multiple injuries.

"It hit me from the side," Ron said. "I was told later that I was thrown about four feet by the impact."

Ron suffered a concussion, a chipped tooth, and some minor mustache damage. He also required four stitches to close an open wound on his nose.

Keith McCaffery, a retired deer biologist with the state Department of Natural Resources, said the accident was most likely not premeditated by the deer.

"He had to be distracted by something else," McCaffery said.

"Whitetails are not particularly protective, even of their young, because they are quite vulnerable to predation.

"They are not as willing to defend their young as, for example, moose which will often stand their ground against predators as large as bears."

"I am well aware of what moose are and what they can do," said Ron, referring to his 2001 encounter with a hermaphrodite moose in the Yukon Territory of Canada (see "Transtesticle Moose" article). "It's the damned deer I can't understand."

McCaffery has his own explanation of what happened.

"I think this incident is evidence that there are too many deer out there...and too many politicians."

Posted by Webmaster at September 3, 2003 11:10 PM